Huh? The boss is siding with the scared guy against him? Oh, he wants to get the count on his side. Mrh, how is Iker supposed to make himself more useful to keep happy than a count?

"The first stage of our meeting, one which I expect to take up most of the day and probably the next, too, is to try to locate every failure in the Chelish system so we can produce a better one. We'll then discuss how the alternate systems used by Lastwall, Galt and the Royal and Imperial Army up in Molthune province would handle these problems, along with any other alternative systems someone wants to propose, and prepare a synthesis plan for military reform. So, 'round the table again. Dolor. What's wrong with the Chelish army?"

"It would be easier to start with what isn't wrong, but to put some order on it... almost nobody wants to serve in it, and even those who do wouldn't if they knew what it was like. The conscription process selects for people too poor and unpopular to get out of it, or people uninterested in being in the army as anything other than a way to rape without retaliation. The training is a joke, with instructors more interested in taking out their grievances than teaching anything, and what they do teach ends up completely useless the moment a soldier finds themself somewhere they can't stay in perfect formation. 

"When they do finish their training, instead of doing the things that need doing with an army, like hunting down bandits and monsters and dealing with corrupt guards, the army spends a third of its time asleep, a third of its time off whoring and raping and gambling, and a third of its time obeying the whims of whatever local notable bribed their officers the most - any actual work is largely incidental. The army's gear starts good, but people who take proper care of their equipment are few and far between, and I doubt we can just expect a new shipment of hellforged breastplates or arrowheads every time we run low like the army used to. And then there's, frankly, the bigger concern that half the army doesn't even nominally obey the officers, and were split up amongst the local barons as their feudal forces or the fists of Asmodeus or the local militias or so forth, which is less of a problem now since the army is about as worthless as they are but means even an actually effective unit would be hamstrung. There's no discipline in the ranks, so whenever a battle slightly turns against a group they run as soon as you make yourself seem scarier than whoever's forcing them to stay, even if you're just one person. And the less said about the officers and sergeants, the better.

"I've got some other thoughts on what the army ought to be equipped with, like replacing the crossbows with proper bows that don't force you to choose between standing still and shooting or ensuring that you can't just trivially outrun any force without a cavalry detachment by not wearing heavy armor, but given the state of the current training I expect the places that could actually make use of them are few and far between. The Sarissas are pretty handy when you can force someone into a proper battle, though."

Oh now she’s just rubbing it in how much nicer it is to be stationed on the home front than the wound front. 

"Sounds about right." Next around. "Captain Artegas?"

"Select, please. Or Delegate. My experience was entirely at the Worldwound and so I know very little about how the Chelish military has behaved domestically and I think the supply constraints and constant demonic threat alleviated some of Delegate Rado's complaints. However, compared to forts of other allegiances we were not able to attract and retain the help of high-quality itinerant adventurers. I think that can change if we solidify a reputation as a Good country, a friend rather than just an ally of convenience," he does really like the line in the Acts about how good has friends and law has allies and only lawful good does both, "and pay on time for services rendered. I also have a disagreement with some of the design of the cold-weather gear but that seems possibly too specific for a committee operating at this high a level of organization, particularly since the need to deploy at the Worldwound will only continue to diminish."

“No! If you have an idea to deal with the cold, you have to say it.”

This is important even if he’s speaking out of turn. He’s tough enough that cold doesn’t bother him, but he’s seen people he actually liked get sick of cold and then replaced with people he didn’t like.

"Call out the problems now, fix them at the end of the session, Delegate Iker. If we start debating this proposal without knowing the scope of the problem we'll get too focused too early. We will fix this, but rushing it is how you end up in a trap."

"Ricard Tosel? I think you may have something useful to bring up here."

"The military academies were dens of Asmodeanism, where the primary occupation seemed to be vicious power politics; my brothers came home worse and crueler men every year.  They produced a surplus of petty tyrants, and if the past two decades of Chelish military history show anything they did not produce competent commanders.  This culture proceeded into the actual military.  My father always seemed more concerned with pleasing his commanding officer and outmaneuvering his rivals and fitting expectations, and for that matter with what he was doing to his lovers, than the performance of his unit."

His grandfather's humiliating defeat at Cyprian's hands might make a good example of Chelish military incompetence, but not everyone present might be familiar with it, so perhaps best to not discuss it till someone else does.

He nods. "Iker? What do you think's wrong with the army?"

Huh? Well, if Xavier wants everyone to just complain and not find solutions, Iker has years of experience griping about the conditions.

"Okay then, here's some problems. Hell gives us decent gear but, when something breaks, you'll get assigned a new one faster than you get it fixed. Then the cost of a new one comes out of your pay, and it's a lot more than what the cost of fixing it would be. Except we don't have enough smiths to fix things, and now without hell we don't have new gear either. I've seen a squad where their half-plate was quarter-plate. Well, the captain beat them all for it, but they're still wearing mostly scrap."

"We're fighting the wrong kind of war. We fight provinces when they leave, that leaves us with less or what we already had. We fight at the worldwound and get nothing out of it. When's the last time we conquered something? Sack a few cities, get some loot, conquer new land and make some new barons?"

"Everyone says that, in Cheliax, they don't call it the 'wound because of the demon hole in the ground, they're just talking about how they spend all their time in the infirmary. You all heard that one before?" Iker has gotten into several fistfights with soldiers from other countries over that fucking joke. "Well it's true. There's barely any healing, compared to what every other country gets. Somehow, switching from hell to heaven made that worse. We went from having halfway useless clerics to having no clerics. I've seen a fort where everyone was melting snow for fresh water. Then I'm in the city here and there's a cleric of that little dancing and birds goddess standing on a square doing little performances based on pamphlets. Why hasn't she been sent to the front?"

"The girl already said what's wrong with training, but I want to say it louder. Squares are all nice against dretches, but when someone gets overrun or when a demon just appears in the middle of the formation and starts eating people– then what? Just die? I had to figure that out myself, got good instincts, but a lot of people didn't figure it out."

"I know everyone is going to complain about the torture, but someone will just say even good armies have punishments. But they need to be lawful at least. There's a priest of asmodeus who paid out of his own salary to bring all kinds of torture devices to his fort, there's another who just makes you play chess. They should give you the same beating for the same reason whichever fort you're in. No matter who you are, not worse if they don't like you. If an officer wants to beat you up just because they don't like you, that should happen off duty in a bar."

Iker maybe has ulterior motives for the standardized punishments, because of the thing where soldiers who are good at fighting can take a lot worse than the conscripts and stay standing.

"The count already said what's wrong with the officers but I want to say it louder. They spend all their time blackmailing or sabotaging each other. I think most officers have more plans against other officers than against the enemy. Two of them order you to do different things and then you have to figure out which one is going to win and live in hell for a few weeks if you get it wrong. Sometimes there's a halfway competent one with the right priorities, but then one of the worse ones loses a battle and makes it look like the competent one's fault."

"Meanwhile a guy who rushes into every battle, takes down big demons not just dretches, and all that, makes it onto the special squad but never gets turned into an officer at all. Doesn't get much of a pay increase either, year after year, until he's trying to bribe a wizard to teleport him to another country so he can make some actual money as a mercenary. Is it pissing off the wrong noble, not being all human, getting into too many bar fights? What is it?? Even the uncivilized places know to put the strong people in charge, how are we worse at it than that?"

Iker stops because he's getting louder each time he adds a new thing and if he keeps going he'll be shouting at the generals and he can't actually do that. 

OH NO THIS GUY KNOWS ABOUT THE CHESS

He nods. "An army like that can't survive." He smiles wryly. "You've heard that ten of Cyprian's marshals started as private soldiers or cavalry troopers?"

"Good numbers. War bloody enough to cull the useless ones must have helped."

Iker has dealt with would-be-Cyprians before. They're one of the better types, easy to flatter. Xavier is the first one to want his way of doing promotions instead of just the military genius. 

"Anything to add about Cheliax's army, Berenguer?"

It's not that hard to see that these people (a) know each other and (b) don't like each other, if you happen to be observant.

"Build an army on Asmodeus and you'll build it on sand, Xavier. That's the Chelish army." And on Asmodeans the same.

Die in a fire, Berenguer.* "A good lesson to learn. Well, in that case it's time of the person with the most experience in the Chelish army, here, to give his story."

(*: This hatred is not immensely obvious except to people who have spent years learning to navigate the treacherous confines of modern Chelish politics, in which case it totally, totally is.)

WHAT is the beef there.

oh no
oh no
hell and the abyss

Iker has already visibly thrown in with Xavier, so hope he wins this one.

Ah, feuding. She knew these people would be doing it too, but she had briefly had hopes they would at least be better about not letting it interfere with their business than the usual Chelish sort.

Melcion is firmly opposed to feuds in the armed forces, but fortunately Berenguer doesn't seem to be in the armed forces, he's just some noble who showed up because you can't stop nobles from showing up. And Xavier's an archduke, so he's a bigger noble.

"You're all just right," he says, "but the truth is, you're just getting started. I know you look at me, you see an old fool and a damned Asmodean collaborator, and maybe I am. But I've been trying to serve the army this whole godsdamned time, make it something the whole Chelish people can be proud of, and it's like trying to make bricks out of quicksand.

"The men we get aren't any good. There's a few who are, sure enough, but  - our army is boys and drunks. In Galt a mason or a tailor will do his part in the army, but in Cheliax it's whoever the lord can't get any more work out of, and he just bribes the recruiting sergeant aside. We let the lords pick which men to give us and they give us the worst, and there's not enough volunteers to make up the loss.

"And if they were good? We wouldn't know what to do them. Because the drillmasters don't know what they're doing. The old army, the army that won the war - they're all dead, and not of age, then we'd still have the hellblood and elfblood left. The Thrunes killed them and summoned devils to do teach new men to do their jobs, and the devils taught 'em the drill of Hell and that doesn't work for humans. They're not outsiders, they're mortal men, and there's only so many times you can beat a man before he's too bloody useless or too bloody angry to fight.

"But you've heard all that. What you haven't heard is why the officers are like that. There's a book - the Forge of Triumph and Damnation. Every year there's a new edition, and every year you memorize it. Get told to quote it, if you quote last year's you're whipped. It's useless. Tells you orcs can't shoot straight and elves are all cowards and the Raha have no healing, tells you that whenever your army won't fight the answer is more beatings, tells you that your priest's always right when he tells you to march all day and night. Only way to kill someone following this book is if the other side is, too - or to use it as a club. Any good officer will ditch it all and any officer will get burned for heresy if he ditches it all.

"Because there's priests following the army, a priest for every company - and that's not near enough! - and inquisitors watching the generals. They don't carry pikes, they've got halberds, and they stand in line with the bearded devils and they hack down any men who runs. That's the way we advance, the only way we've ever advanced. They don't put the devils in the front rank, they don't give them pikes. You march or you die. And what you get out of that is priests with their throats cut and sentries with missing knives, and then you don't have the Blessings you need if you're going to fight.

"But say a good officer gets out of the army. Say he gets a priest who doesn't want to be knifed in the night, one who wants to win. What's that matter? You don't get promoted for good work, you get promoted for sucking up and framing your boss and saying 'Hail Asmodeus' louder than anyone else! It's religious to say we're better than the Rahadoumi so it's got to be more religious to say one of us can beat ten of them, so that's what they promote people for, and it's even more religious to lead your whole army to get beaten ten-to-one, so if you don't it means you're a traitor and a heretic, and then they burn you.

"And let's talk about logistics. They say ours are the envy of Avistan. Why? Because of the wizards? Wizard teleport it up to the Worldwound, sure. Great. Means we've got no wizards - no good wizards - for anything else, all they're doing is Worldwound, Worldwound, Worldwound. There's bound elementals over the border, and the earth ones come up out of the dirt and grab you under and leave you three feet into the rock, air ones scout - our scouts are imps, and imps are all lying bastards. All we've got is them and the bloody bearded devils. And you want to talk about anything else? They talk about all the skeletons and how much they haul but the things creep you out, better not to have them." This is false. "Maybe the horses eat well, if they're cavalry. Mules, though - who'll complain if they're off their feed? Who'll complain if half of them are lame? Who'll care if all the supplies disappear, we can solve that, we've got wizards. Not blood enough.

"And let's imagine you fix this, it doesn't help. The soldiers still fight and get killed. Because nobody but the soldiers are fighting anyway. They're being clerks. They're making up numbers and writing them down to cover up the supplies they're stealing, because they didn't get sent enough and because nine out of every ten lieutenants are just greedy bastards. And why? Because they were clerks before and clerks' sons. You don't get warrior blood, in the officers; the Thrunes killed them all because they might fight back. You want to know who's in charge of the army? The people in charge of the army are merchants and moneylenders who look at the mud and go back to their nice lovely book that tells them everything they need to know, and then their men all die. It's nine base at the school to every one who's noble, and not a single lowborn man who's ever held a sword.

"And why? Because everyone who'll stand up to the Asmodeans is dead. That's why I'm telling you this and not someone who fixed it. Because it couldn't bloody well be fixed before the Thrunes were gone, and good riddance to them!"

Well, that explains how Blai succeeded in never being promoted.

She'd say that was an impressive amount of ass covering, but she has in fact met Chelish officers before - this is pretty much par for the course. Probably some of the stuff that she didn't already know even has the virtue of being true. A few years back she might have protested that the army needed more Hellish discipline instead of less, but it's not like Asmodeus' clerics didn't run like the rest once you got rid of their human shields - she'll buy that the whole edifice there is as broken as the rest of it. She'll push back against one bit, though.

"I rather doubt it's the ancestry that makes the officers useless. I knew a few people whose parents were half-decent soldiers, and their kids certainly weren't much less useless than average."

So, he wants to blame asmodeus and his devils for the officers all being like that. Easy excuse. The explanation of how they’re all clerks with weak blood sounds more right. 

“No, he’s right. When they get the someone with blood that makes him run into fights, even before being drilled, the officers get scared.”